The present inventive disclosure relates to culinary utensils used to grasp and/or control food items during the preparation or serving of food, whether in the kitchen, outdoor barbeque, or other setting where food is being prepared for consumption or is being offered for serving.
Typically, in culinary venues, there are a variety of culinary utensils used to manipulate food items, including food items being prepared on cooking surfaces such as pans, griddles, and grills. Usually, one or more spatula tools are available and at least one pair of traditional tongs are available. With respect to spatulas, when being used to slide under a food item; e.g., a hamburger patty on a grill; the user must try to slide the spatula under the food member by introducing its longitudinally distal end/edge under the food item and thrust under the food item to hopefully manipulate the food item fully onto and substantially centered on the spatula's upper surface. What instead often happens is that the user often “chases” the target food item around the cooking surface as the spatula edge contacts the proximal end of the target food item, and the “chase” does not end until the side of the pan, grill, etc. is encountered by the food item to for it to stay in place such that the spatula can be successfully slipped underneath. In the case of an outdoor grill, this can result in potentially unwanted grease and/or soot contacting the distal end of the target food item, in addition to being frustrating to the cook. Moreover, a similar result occurs if a user attempts to slidably engage a target food item with the side of a typical spatula tool.
There exists in the art many various spatulas that incorporate some sort of clamping utensil to help secure/grasp food downward onto the upper spatula surface (see, e.g., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2006/0202494 to Di Paolo and U.S. Pat. No. D519,332 to Sanchez, among others). However, no culinary utensils known in the art enable a user to easily direct a target food item onto the majority of the upper surface area of a spatula. What is needed is a culinary tool to provide greater control to a user to accomplish this.